Do You Really Want To Say You Do “Community Service”?
Kevin provides a community service with some good advice.
March 25, 2021
I recently had a conversation with a friend about an ever-more stressful topic for all high school juniors: college applications. I learned what college he was aiming for, a top school, and further asked how he planned to get there.
Among other things, here was his answer: “Oh I think I have a good chance. I have clubs and community service”.
“Community service”
To give some context: when looking at student applications, many colleges advertise their methods of “holistic review.” Meaning that beyond GPA, standardized test scores, and such, college admissions officers are also looking for overall well rounded applicants. They seek out applicants who demonstrate good and ambitious intentions to improve their communities and the world as a whole. And so in order to display their “love” for the community, many students take part in volunteering activities.
And this is true, students who participate in volunteer activities and place these services on their college applications become more attractive to colleges. In fact, in a survey of admissions officers from US colleges done by IESD, 58% of admissions personnel agreed that “community service experience has a positive impact on his or her acceptance”.
To make things clear, I agree with this standpoint: community service is generally a good indicator of individuals’ characters. But is adding “community service” really a great addition to your resume?
Imagine you are a Harvard admissions officer. In 2020, Harvard received 39,041 applications, and awarded a record low 5.2% of these students admission to their prestigious university.
You go through hundreds of these applications every day, looking through transcripts, standardized test scores, resumes, and essays. Harvard applicants being as they are, driven students, many if not all will have “community service” somewhere in their application.
After going through all of these applications you grow sick of the entire process, sick of seeing every applicant’s community service: “50 hours of community service”, “100 hours of community service”, and so on. Everyone’s resume becomes the same in this sense, but you still must admit a few chosen applicants.
Then, finally, you stumble across one application offering a breath of fresh air. “Dedicated afternoons to packaging food for the less fortunate.” In essence, this is the same as community service, but the presentation sets it miles apart. And, all else being the same, this application’s genuine wording will set it apart from all the others, and make it into that 5.2%.
What to take away from this article: the term “community service” is a poison to your college application. You are not a petty thief, sentenced by a judge to do community service, or even just doing your community service hours as a requirement. Present yourself as a genuine, well intending, charitable person (even if you are not), and make use of your wording to achieve this goal.
